Taegan Goddard's Political Wire

August 31, 2009

Republicans Abandoning Health Care Talks?

It's increasingly clear that the Obama administration's health care reform plan will happen via budget reconciliation, which requires a simple majority in the Senate instead of a filibuster-proof majority.

At his briefing earlier today, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs blasted Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) -- one of the "gang of six" negotiators on the Senate Finance Committee seeking a bipartisan health care compromise -- for repeating "generic Republican talking points" in his party's weekly radio address.

Said Gibbs: "It appears at least in Sen. Enzi's case, he doesn't believe there's a pathway to get bipartisan support and the president disagrees. Sen. Enzi's clearly turned over his cards on bipartisanship."

This comes as news breaks that Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) -- the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee -- is actually raising money for his re-election campaign on the basis of stopping President Obama's health care reform efforts.

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Taegan D. Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Washington Post, USA Today, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer and Christian Science Monitor.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

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